The Movement for National Academic Standards: A Comparison of the ... - ed

The Movement for National Academic Standards: A Comparison of the Common Core State Standards Initiative in

the USA and the National Curriculum in Australia

Michael Watt

Paper for presentation at the conference of the Australian Curriculum Studies Association, Hotel Realm, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory,

Australia, 2 to 4 October 2009

Copyright (c) 2009 by Michael Watt

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author. Requests for permission should be addressed in writing to the author.

Author: Michael Watt Address: 316 Churchill Avenue, Sandy Bay, Tasmania 7005, Australia Phone: 61 3 6225 1335 E-mail: michaelgwatt@internode.

Cataloguing in Publication Data

Watt, Michael The Movement for National Academic Standards: A Comparison of the Common Core State Standards Initiative in the USA and the National Curriculum in Australia

1. Educational standards ? United States and Australia.

2

Preface

National academic standards for what students should be taught in schools were established in the USA in response to President George H. W. Bush's Charlottesville Education Summit held in September 1989. National curriculum statements and profiles were inaugurated by the Australian Education Council in July 1988 in response to the desire of states and territories to work collaboratively on curriculum development. Policy makers in both the USA and Australia now view adaptation of national documents arising from these efforts by state jurisdictions has increased variability in what students learn across both countries. In response to these perceptions, policy makers have initiated innovative activities to overcome such variability by developing common core standards in the USA and a national curriculum in Australia. These innovations are likely to have substantial implications for teaching and learning in schools in both countries during the next decade.

This paper represents an attempt to gain a better understanding of the change process involved in each innovation, and to draw some conclusions at an early stage about the likely success of each initiative. The demands of such a task required assistance and advice from people working in the field. The author wishes to acknowledge the contributions made by the following people with regard to particular aspects in the paper referring to the USA. Chester Finn, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, Carrie Heath, senior associate with the Council of Chief State School Officers, Ilene Berman, program director with the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Allison Armour-Garb, director of education studies with the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government are thanked for reviewing and commenting on draft versions of this paper. Paul Barton, senior associate with the Educational Testing Service is thanked for reviewing the summary of his report, National Education Standards: Getting beneath the Surface. Raegen Miller, associate director with the Center for American Progress is thanked for directing the author's attention to the report, The Opportunity Equation: Transforming Mathematics and Science Education for Citizenship and the Global Economy, published by the Commission on Mathematics and Science Education. The author wishes to acknowledge the contributions made by the following people with regard to particular aspects in the paper referring to Australia. Anthony Kitchen, curriculum manager with the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority is thanked for reviewing and commenting on the draft version of this paper. The author also wishes to acknowledge dialogue with Paul Kiem, president of the History Teachers Association of Australia, whose comments offered insight into the decision making process involved in developing the national curriculum.

Biographical note

Michael Watt taught in several secondary schools in Tasmania, and worked as an education officer in the Tasmania Department of Education. He holds masters' degrees in educational studies and education from the University of Tasmania, and a doctorate in education from the University of Canberra. He currently works as an education consultant.

3

The Movement for National Academic Standards: A Comparison of the Common Core State Standards Initiative in

the USA and the National Curriculum in Australia

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the nature of activities in the change process undertaken by two initiatives to produce national standards in academic disciplines, national assessments and accountability measures. The Common Core State Standards Initiative, a project coordinated by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, aims to produce common core standards for states in the USA, and the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority aims to produce a national curriculum. Content analysis method was applied to summarise information obtained from searches on the web sites of organisations involved in these initiatives and education newspapers. A model for classifying the activities of research, development, diffusion and adoption in the change process was applied to evaluate the two innovations. The results showed that activities involving research and development, at which point evaluation of both innovations was made, were well-defined. Each initiative was preceded by publication of policy documents advocating innovation and research activities to uncover possibilities for change, although these activities were more extensive and substantial in the USA than Australia. The emphases in each innovation for developing academic standards are different. Benchmarking standards against state, national and international standards, using a research-based process for decision making, reviewing successive drafts by stakeholders, and conducting an independent validation characterise the Common Core State Standards Initiative. Specifying plans and guidelines, inventing and refining standards, using a consensus-building process for decision making, and reviewing successive drafts by stakeholders characterise the national curriculum initiative in Australia. Initial steps to sustain adoption of the innovations are the formation of the National Policy Forum to build support for the Common Core State Standards Initiative and foundation of the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. However, attention to other activities to assist practitioners adopt the innovations are lacking in both initiatives. The paper concludes by presenting some judgments about the potential success of each initiative.

4

The Movement for National Academic Standards: A Comparison of the Common Core State Standards Initiative in

the USA and the National Curriculum in Australia

Introduction

A common antecedent influenced standards-based education in the USA and a nationally agreed curriculum in Australia. The principles of outcomesbased education provided a foundation for both the standards movement in the USA and national curriculum collaboration in Australia, although subsequent events led to the role of outcomes-based education becoming significantly different in the two countries.

The key principle of outcomes-based education of identifying outcomes, and then constructing a curriculum to achieve them, formed the process in initial standards-setting exercises in some states in the USA in the early 1990s. Attacks by conservative Christian groups over the emphasis in outcomesbased education on the teaching of values, the presentation of radical social, political and economic values, the promotion of a whole language approach in reading, and multicultural education were a major factor in stifling these reforms. However, a multiplicity of trends in American education had concurred by this time leading conservatives and liberals to forge a consensus about focusing on what students should learn. From this consensus, the definition of national standards based on academic disciplines issued from the six National Education Goals expounded following the Charlottesville Education Summit convened by President George H. W. Bush in September 1989 (Vinovskis, 1999). Policy makers set nationally recognised groups in key disciplines the task of developing national standards consisting of content, performance and opportunity-to-learn standards (National Education Goals Panel, 1993). This shift in standardssetting, described by Ravitch (1995) as constituting the setting of clear and measurable content standards, focusing on cognitive learning, and basing content standards on traditional academic disciplines, set the standards movement apart from outcomes-based education. Spady (1998) concluded that the ascendancy of standards-based education relegated outcomesbased education to a marginal position. The Goals 2000: Educate America Act, passed by the Clinton Administration in March 1994, required state education agencies to use the national standards as blueprints to develop and align state standards to state assessments. From July 1994, state education agencies applied to the United States Department of Education for Goals 2000 grants under Title III to develop and implement comprehensive education improvement plans, which included establishing challenging state standards. Each state education agency was required to appoint a broadly representative panel to develop state improvement plans in consultation with the state governor and the chief state school officer. The Improving America's School Act, passed by the Clinton Administration in October 1994, required each state to develop state content and performance standards for mathematics and reading by the 1997-1998 school year, and state assessments aligned to these standards by the 2000-2001 school year.

5

 ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download